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The EU has declared three leaks in two Russia-Germany gas pipelines to be the work of sabotage and suspicion has fallen on Russia.

Some commentators have suggested the leaks are linked to the Ukraine war, though the Kremlin has described the accusations it was behind them as “predictable” and “stupid”.

Here is what we know about what happened to Nord Stream 1 and 2, who could have been responsible and what’s being done about it.

What happened and where

On Monday morning, at around 2am local time, bubbles are thought to have started erupting on the surface of a section of the Baltic Sea between Sweden and Poland, about 14 miles (23km) southeast of Denmark’s Bornholm Island.

That morning, it was reported that pressure in the Nord Stream 2 pipeline had dropped overnight from 105 bars to 7 bars, indicating a leak.

The Nord Stream 2 pipe runs for 764 miles (1,230km) from Russia through the Baltic Sea to Germany and had been due to carry billions of cubic feet of gas to Europe until Russia invaded Ukraine and Germany refused to grant the pipeline’s operators a licence, leaving it mothballed.

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Denmark scrambled military aircraft to look for signs of a leak and identified an area of disturbed sea, which they designated a danger to shipping.

The time of the leak was confirmed by readings taken by seismologists in neighbouring countries, who registered the equivalent of an earthquake magnitude of 1.8, which they triangulated to have occurred at almost exactly the same spot as the leak was bubbling to the surface.

About 17 hours after the Nord Stream 2 reading was taken, a second reading was recorded by seismologists northeast of Bornholm, indicating another incident.

Shortly after, Nord Stream AG, the operator of the Nord Stream 1, said it was looking into causes of a drop in pressure in the pipeline.

Again, seismologists’ readings located the incident to a specific location – around 34 miles (55km) northeast of Bornholm Island.

The following morning, Sweden’s Maritime Authority issued a warning of two leaks in the Nord Stream 1 pipeline in its and Danish waters, bringing the total number of leaks to three.

Nord Stream 1 follows a similar but not identical route from Russia to Germany and had been used to ship Russian gas to Europe since 2011, until the outbreak of the Ukraine war.

As Europe reeled from the Vladimir Putin’s invasion, it moved to reduce its reliance on gas from Russia, and simultaneously, flows through Nord Stream 1 to Europe from Russia decreased until no gas was flowing through the pipeline.

Footage from the scene taken from a Danish plane showed frothy seas, up to a kilometre wide.

What do the experts say

Initially, the European countries nearby were cautious, saying investigation was needed to find out what had happened.

The operator of the pipelines said the leaks were “unprecedented”, but did not have an explanation for them.

The Kremlin was quick to say sabotage could not be ruled out.

In the course of Tuesday, seismologists who had recorded the incidents said their analysis indicated the tremors had been caused by explosions.

Bjorn Lund, director of the Swedish National Seismic Network, said: “There’s no doubt, this is not an earthquake.”

By Wednesday, many politicians were adamant that the damage to the pipes was caused by human activity and deliberate, rather than because of earthquakes or accidental.

Danish defence minister Morten Bodskov said on Wednesday: “Our assessment is… that the breakage on the pipes is not an accident but a deliberate act.”

Pic: Swedish Coast Guard
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The Danish and Swedish military have been observing the bubbling at the surface. Pic: Swedish Coast Guard

Who was responsible

Very early on, suspicion fell on Russia. A number of commentators asked who would profit from such ruptures in the pipelines, noting how it had the potential to affect gas prices.

Ukraine blamed Russia immediately, with presidential adviser Myhailo Podolyak saying the leak was “a terrorist attack planned by Russia and an act of aggression towards the EU”, without offering any evidence.

Gas prices soared again on Monday, largely in reaction to a threat from Moscow to sanction Ukrainian energy firm Naftogaz, raising the possibility that one of the last functioning Russian gas supply routes to Europe would close down.

But many expressed disbelief that Russia would target infrastructure that carried gas that it had sold, threatening its future revenues. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov called such accusations “predictable and… stupid”.

Yet there has been much speculation that an attack by Russia on the pipelines could be a warning to the West not to escalate the Ukraine war further.

This is because the pipelines were not operational at the time and they supplied Russian gas, so would be less likely to be seen as a further significant provocation.

Russia has been becoming increasingly frustrated that Western supplied weapons have been helping Ukraine resist Moscow’s invasion.

On Tuesday Poland’s President Andrzej Duda symbolically opened the valve of a yellow pipe belonging to the Baltic Pipe, a new system sending Norwegian gas across Denmark and the Baltic Sea to Poland, which he hailed as ending “Russian domination in the gas sphere”.

Some commentators have pointed out that while the gas leaks erupted in Denmark and Sweden’s Exclusive Economic Zones, they were outside their territorial waters, and therefore could be classed as having happened in international waters, making retaliation more complicated.

Others have cited the fact that there are significant networks of piping under the North Sea that could be vulnerable to attack. If the cause of the leaks is proven to have been an attack, it would reveal the ease with which undersea infrastructure can be targeted.

The method used by any potential saboteurs is far from clear. Russia has submarines which Western experts say are equipped to attack international internet cables, but there are suggestions the vessel was out of range at the time. Others say deep sea divers, travelling from the nearby Russian exclave of Kaliningrad, could have planted a device.

How will we find out

Experts say they expect that navies from surrounding countries will send teams with specialist experience into the area to carry out investigations.

Mr Bodskov said the Danish military had increased its presence within and around the area of Bornholm and they would be “doing everything within their power to get this clarified which is happening in close collaboration with our partners”.

But he said it may take some weeks.

“If you listen to the experts about how much gas there is the pipes and how long it will take before the pressure drops, then the reality is that might take a week, 14 days before it is calm enough in the area to actually see what has happened,” he added.

Any investigation is likely to look closely at damage to the pipes, which, at around 1,153mm in diameter with 34mm thick steel walls, surrounded by, in some cases, more than 110mm of concrete, would be difficult to crack.

bFILE PHOTO: Workers are seen at the construction site of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, near the town of Kingisepp, Leningrad region, Russia, June 5, 2019. REUTERS/Anton Vaganov/File Photo
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Investigations are likely to look at damage to the pipe which is 34mm thick steel and covered, when underwater, with more than 100mm of concrete

Peter Faulding, one of the foremost British underwater forensic investigators, whose Specialist Group International has been involved in numerous undersea investigations carried out by UK police, said he expects the initial investigation to involve remotely operated vehicles (ROVs), which are also known as drones.

“People will be very wary about putting divers near it because… you’ve got a large amount of gas coming out,” he told Sky News.

“I would say they’d be using remote operated vehicles to go down. An ROV, because they have manipulators on the front. If there was any debris, the manipulator… can retrieve the evidence and an ROV will give crystal clear pictures without putting a diver in jeopardy.

“A lot them are autonomous now. They can send them down without a cable and they can actually pick things up off the sea bed.

“You would see what it was. If it was done with explosive, it will be very rough. There’ll be residues. There’d be fragments.

“From that, they can carry out appropriate forensic tests to see what explosive it was, if an explosive has been used.”

Mr Faulding, who has previous military experience and carries out consultancy work for the energy industry, said once it was safe, because the pipelines are at a depth of about 70m, the navies would probably put down divers operating out of a diving bell, but they would have to breathe a special mixture and would work in a similar way to those who carry out work on undersea oil facilities.

He said it should not be difficult to work out which explosive, if any, had been used, but it would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to work out who carried out an attack.

What are the consequences

In the immediate aftermath, European leaders expressed concern and said they would work to find out what had happened.

The gas markets remained volatile, but experts said that much of Tuesday’s volatility was due to fears that Russia would stop shipping gas through Ukraine, rather that because of the possibility of an attack on Nord Stream 1 or 2.

Nonetheless, experts said that the leaks had added to the uncertainty that has been fuelling much higher gas prices this year than in previous years.

Oil and gas company Statoil gas processing and CO2 removal platform Sleipner T is pictured in the offshore near the Stavanger, Norway,
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Norway has a substantial gas and oil industry network across the North Sea, supplying much of Europe

Gas analyst Tom Marzec-Manser told Sky News: “The market opened bullishly yesterday in response to the Nord Stream stuff. But then it jumped significantly when that Ukraine development happened, when Gazprom threatened the sanctions. That actually was a larger wedge of the gains yesterday. But it’s definitely all part and parcel of the… loss of yet more Russian gas (being) the main driver to a 27% jump yesterday in wholesale prices.”

Despite doubts in the gas industry that any potential attacks could spread, Norway’s state oil company, Equinor, said it would raise its level of preparedness.

The alert was raised overnight and applies to all of Equinor’s facilities.

Norway is a major producer of offshore oil and gas and its energy exports have surged as European countries scramble to find alternatives to Russian energy supplies.

Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store said: “We are concerned with taking good care of the safety of our own oil and gas installations, and we have stepped up the state of preparedness regarding them today.”

Royal Norwegian Navy officer Lieutenant Commander Tor Ivar Strommen warned that there could be attacks on Norwegian energy exports “in the next half year”.

NATO and the European Union stressed the need to protect critical infrastructure and warned of a “robust and united response” should there be more attacks.

Mr Strommen told Reuters: “The Norwegian government has to realise that by far the most important strategic object in all of Europe now is the energy or gas imports from Norway.

“If those deliveries should be cut or stopped or reduced by a large amount, this would cause a complete energy crisis in Europe.”

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Every shop and home burned or ransacked: The Syrian city engulfed in tribal violence

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Every shop and home burned or ransacked: The Syrian city engulfed in tribal violence

The Syrian presidency has announced it’s assembling a special taskforce to try to stop nearly a week of sectarian clashes in the southern Druze city of Sweida.

The presidency called for restraint on all sides and said it is making strenuous efforts to “stop the fighting and curb the violations that threaten the security of the citizens and the safety of society”.

By early Saturday morning, a ceasefire had been confirmed by the US special envoy for Syria, Tom Barrack, who posted on X that Syrian President Ahmed al Sharaa and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had agreed to a ceasefire supported by US secretary of state Marco Rubio.

The post went on to state that this agreement had the support of “Turkey, Jordan and its neighbours” and called upon the Druze, Bedouins, and Sunni factions to put down their arms.

Sky News special correspondent Alex Crawford reports from the road leading to Sweida, the city that has become the epicentre of Syria’s sectarian violence.

For the past 24 hours, we’ve watched as Syria‘s multiple Arab tribes began mobilising in the Sweida province to help defend their Bedouin brethren.

A fighter aims a gun
A body is wrapped in a blanket

Thousands travelled from multiple different Syrian areas and had reached the edge of Sweida city by Friday nightfall after a day of almost non-stop violent clashes and killings.

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“We have come to protect the [Arab] Bedouin women and children who are being terrorised by the Druze,” they told us.

A fighter in Syria
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Arab fighters said they had come to protect the Bedouin women and children

Fighters at a gas station
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Fighters at a petrol station

Every shop and every home in the streets leading up to Sweida city has been burned or ransacked, the contents destroyed or looted.

We saw tribal fighters loading the back of pickup trucks and driving away from the city with vehicles packed with looted goods from Druze homes.

A burning building
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Shops and homes leading up to Sweida city have been burned or ransacked

A burned out car

Several videos posted online showed violence against the Druze, including one where tribal fighters force three men to throw themselves off a high-rise balcony and are seen being shot as they do so.

Doctors at the nearby community hospital in Buser al Harir said there had been a constant stream of casualties being brought in. As we watched, another dead fighter was carried out of an ambulance.

The medics estimated there had been more than 600 dead in their area alone. “The youngest child who was killed was a one-and-a-half-year-old baby,” one doctor told us.

A doctor talks to Sky's Alex Crawford
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Doctors said there had been a constant stream of casualties due to violence

The violence is the most dangerous outbreak of sectarian clashes since the fall of the Bashar al Assad regime last December – and the most serious challenge for the new leader to navigate.

The newly brokered deal is aimed at ending the sectarian killings and restoring some sort of stability in a country which is emerging from more than a decade of civil war.

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Israel and Syria agree to ceasefire, says US ambassador to Turkey

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Israel and Syria agree to ceasefire, says US ambassador to Turkey

Israel and Syria have agreed to a ceasefire, the US ambassador to Turkey has said.

Several hundred people have reportedly been killed this week in the south of Syria in violence involving local fighters, government authorities and Bedouin tribes.

As the violence escalated in the southern province of Sweida, Israel launched airstrikes, including attacks on Wednesday on the defence ministry in Damascus and a target near the presidential palace.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government said it aimed to protect Syrian Druze – part of a small but influential minority that also has followers in Lebanon and Israel.

Clashes between Bedouin and Druze groups further tensions in the Middle East

In a post on X, the US ambassador to Turkey, Tom Barrack, said Israel and Syria had agreed to a ceasefire supported by Turkey, Jordan and others.

“We call upon Druze, Bedouins, and Sunnis to put down their weapons and together with other minorities build a new and united Syrian identity,” Mr Barrack said in a post on X.

The Israeli embassy in Washington and Syrian Consulate in Canada did not immediately comment or respond to requests for comment from the Reuters news agency.

The ceasefire announcement came after the US worked to put an end to the conflict, with secretary of state Marco Rubio saying on Wednesday that steps had been agreed to end a “troubling and horrifying situation”.

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Why is Israel bombing Syria?

After Israel warned it would destroy forces attacking Syrian Druze, Syrian President Ahmed al Sharaa told the minority group in a televised statement on Thursday that “we reject any attempt to drag you into hands of an external party”.

He then claimed Israel has “consistently targeted our stability and created discord among us since the fall of the former regime”.

It comes after the United Nations’ migration agency said earlier on Friday that nearly 80,000 people had been displaced in the region since violence broke out on Sunday.

It also said that essential services, including water and electricity, had collapsed in Sweida, telecommunications systems were widely disrupted, and health facilities in Sweida and Daraa were under severe strain.

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‘Horrific incident’ at sheriff training facility in LA – at least three people dead

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'Horrific incident' at sheriff training facility in LA - at least three people dead

At least three people have been killed after a “horrific incident” at a Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department training facility, officials have said.

A spokesperson for the department said there was an explosion at the Biscailuz Center Academy Training in east LA.

The incident was reported at around 7.30am local time (3.30pm UK time).

Aerial footage from local channel KABC-TV suggests the blast happened in a parking lot filled with sheriff patrol cars and box trucks.

The Eugene Biscailuz Center Academy Training in East Los Angeles. Pic: NBC Los Angeles
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The training centre in east LA. Pic: NBC Los Angeles

Attorney general Pam Bondi wrote on X: “I just spoke to @USAttyEssayli about what appears to be a horrific incident that killed at least three at a law enforcement training facility in Los Angeles.

“Our federal agents are at the scene and we are working to learn more.”

California congressman Jimmy Sanchez said the explosion had “claimed the lives of at least three deputies”.

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“My condolences to the families and everyone impacted by this loss,” he said.

Media and law enforcement stage near the site of an explosion at the LA County Sheriff's Special Operations Bureau on Friday, July 18, 2025, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Etienne Laurent)
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Media and law enforcement officials near the explosion site. Pic: AP

The attorney general said in a follow-up post that agents from the FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives are “on the ground to support”.

The mayor of Los Angeles, Karen Bass, said the LAPD bomb squad has also responded to the scene.

“The thoughts of all Angelenos are with all of those impacted by this blast,” she said.

California Governor Gavin Newsom has been briefed on the incident, his press office said in a post on X.

“The Governor’s Office of Emergency Services is in contact with the Sheriff’s Department and closely monitoring the situation, and has offered full state assistance,” it added.

The cause of the explosion is being investigated.

This breaking news story is being updated and more details will be published shortly.

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You can receive breaking news alerts on a smartphone or tablet via the Sky News app. You can also follow us on WhatsApp and subscribe to our YouTube channel to keep up with the latest news.

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